Rubio to campaign 'as long as it takes' to beat Trump

KENNESAW, Ga. — Marco Rubio continued his all-out assault on Donald Trump here Saturday and vowed to remain in the race as long as it takes to stop the businessman from winning the Republican nomination.

“I will do whatever it takes, I will campaign as long as it takes,” the Florida senator told a crowd of more than 7,000 people who encircled him on the sidelines of a high-school football field. “Donald Trump, a con artist, will never get control of this party.”

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Rubio, still looking to consolidate the anti-Trump vote and to make this five-way fight a two-man race, faces the prospect of the real-estate magnate and party front-runner winning Georgia and most of the southern states that go to the polls on Tuesday — and himself emerging from “Super Tuesday” still not having won a state.

“We’re in the proportional part of the process,” Rubio told reporters. “We feel very optimistic about the amount of delegates we’re going to win. The majority of Republican voters do not want Donald Trump to be our nominee. And they are going to rally around whomever is the last one standing fighting against him.”

Trump, who picked up his most significant endorsement from an establishment figure on Friday when New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie signed on, is intent on steamrolling his way to the nomination.

Rubio, who is focused on picking up delegates, which are allotted proportionally in Georgia and other March 1 states by congressional district, continues to argue that winning states outright as Trump has doesn’t guarantee victory. And now, his campaign is pushing back on pundits arguing that he must win his home state of Florida on March 15 to remain viable in his party’s nomination fight, signaling to supporters an unwavering commitment to battle Trump to the end.

“We are elevating what this race is about,” said Todd Harris, a senior Rubio adviser. “This race is no longer just about who the nominee is going to be; it’s no longer just about who the next president is going to be. It is about the very future of the conservative movement, the Reagan revolution and our country.”

Rubio emphasized the point to reporters ahead of his rally here, asserting that he “will be in this race as long as it takes” to prevent Trump from winning the 1,237 delegates he needs to secure the nomination.

After avoiding sparring with Trump for months, Rubio is suddenly throwing haymakers at the front-runner, casting him as a “con man who will undermine the Constitution” and noting that he has “never voted in a Republican primary."

As he stood on a platform beneath a packed grandstand, Rubio cast Trump as a con-artist who is over-selling his record as a successful businessman, glossing over the four bankruptcies and failed business ventures from Trump Ties to Trump University that Rubio is now eager to point out.

“The party of Lincoln and Reagan is on the verge of being taken over by a con artist,” he told the crowd. “A con artist identifies people who are struggling and convinces you they have something to turn it around. That is what he is doing now to millions of Americans.”

In engaging Trump directly, Rubio is also mimicking Trump in offering up the kind of personal and sophomoric barbs that are the businessman’s own trademark. After suggesting Friday that Trump might have urinated in his pants during Thursday night’s debate, Rubio mocked him on Saturday for having “the worst spray tan in America.”

“Donald Trump likes to sue people,” Rubio riffed, as the crowd laughed. “He should sue whoever did that to his face.”

Rubio's sudden shift into attack mode threatens to overwhelm the optimistic, future-focused message that defined his campaign for months. As he closed out his speech, he attempted to fuse the two messages into one.

“I know this is a difficult time,” he told voters. “But I ask that you not fall prey to fear. Do not fall prey to hopelessness. Do not fall prey to a con job.”